Description

Leo Tolstoy Letter Signed Outlining His Philosophy of Life.
Five pages in French, 8.375" x 10.5", Toula, Russia, July 10/23,
1901, to "Mon Prince," Prince Mirza Reza Khan Arfa, the former
Persian Minister in St. Petersburg. A highly important letter,
outlining his entire philosophy of life. Signed at close: "Leon
Tolstoy", a rare signature as he generally signed "Leo" rather
than "Leon." Included with this lot is a copy of a 1992-dated
Certificate of Authenticity from Charles Hamilton who calls this "A
wonderful letter from a great writer..."

Tolstoy thanks the recipient for sending him a poem, responding to
the views of a character in it -- that the roots of evil are egoism
and ignorance -- with a summation of his own personal credo: that
the most important ignorance is ignorance of the 'true religion ...
within the reach of all men, founded upon reason, common to all
peoples and therefore imperative for all. The principle of this
religion is expressed in the Gospel by these words: "Do unto others
as you would have them do unto you"'. Tolstoy cannot concur with
his correspondent's view that a sense of brotherhood is possible
between states and their heads, holding that true brotherhood would
render obsolete all distinctions of authority -- 'All should obey
God and not man' -- and also that wars, which are perpetuated by
the self-interest of governments, would be abolished by the 'true
religion', which would make the killing of others and by extension
military service ('which is nothing other than preparation for
murder') impossible: 'Wars can only be abolished by the individuals
who are their victims. They will only be abolished when the true
religion will be so widespread that the majority of men will be
ready to suffer violence rather than to use it'. He ends by
offering his excuses for not writing in his own hand, for he is ill
and in bed.

Mirza Reza Khan Arfa'-ed-Dowleh, a distinguished Persian diplomat
who ultimately became ambassador plenipotentiary at the Sublime
Porte, received the title Khan for devising a reformed alphabet
which better adapted the Arabic alphabet to Persian. Tolstoy's
idiosyncratic religious views dominated his life and literary
output from the time of A Confession (1882) onward; in 1901
he was excommunicated by the Orthodox Church; by the time of the
present letter he had fallen seriously ill, to the extent that he
was to spend a significant period of recuperation in the Crimea.
Tolstoy's espousal of non-violence was to be a significant
influence on Gandhi and Martin Luther King.